


a soft epilogue

by bluenebulae



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fix-It, The Long Night
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 03:10:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18651688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluenebulae/pseuds/bluenebulae
Summary: Theon thought he'd made his peace with death by now, but somehow, she continues to surprise him.





	a soft epilogue

He’d known all along.

Theon has seen death many times, on many different faces. He’s felt it himself—he’d hoped to, at least, enough times that it feels as if he has. And the night before, he’d realized.

He is tired.

He’d known all along what it would mean to accompany Bran—the brother he’d once carelessly doomed. A body could only survive so much, and Theon Greyjoy’s had taken more than enough blows. This would be his last stand, and if he is telling himself the truth, he is relieved.

When the ice pierces the darkness, he is afraid, because he is still—blessedly—human. But as Bran’s voice rings out behind him, it fills his veins with iron. This is where he’s meant to be.

And yet—

As he steels himself, as he turns, as he charges, there’s a flash, flaming red across the blue. The echo of a voice. Eyes, not icy blue, but soft. Her face fills his vision, unbidden, and Theon’s steps falter just barely.

Theon thought he'd made his peace with death by now, but somehow, she continues to surprise him.

_“What will you do after?”_

_Steam curls around Sansa’s face, high cheekbones, full lips, eyes Theon had seen filled with despair and anger and hope. Eyes that now hold his, steady, probing._

_“I wasn’t thinking of an after,” Theon says carefully._

_Sansa sets down her soup bowl._

_“Theon,” she says. “Theon, you can’t.”_

_“I’m tired.” He could elaborate, but he knows that she, of anyone, will understand._

_“After everything—” She cuts off, hangs her head. Theon wishes he could snatch the words back from the frigid air, true as they are, to wipe the pain from her shoulders._

_“You can’t give up like this. Theon. Please.”_

_“What’s left for me?” he asks gruffly._

_“Me. You can try for me.” She looks up through strands of flaming hair, the same look she’d given him in that icy forest, snow on her lashes and her heartbeat against his chest._

_“You’ll always have me to return to.”_

He turns.

The polearm swings wide, missing the icy figure. But the Night King, in all his impenetrability, has miscalculated as well, and his stake only scratches Theon’s side. Theon feints to the left.

She’s not splayed across his vision anymore, but Sansa is there with him in the Godswood, the iron in his veins molten now, just enough. The rest of the night’s demons are still around them—almost amused. It would be easy to charge into the king’s embrace and let the winter take him, but Sansa won’t let him.

A falling flash of brown, then. A searing pain in his shoulder, and sleep overtakes Theon’s body.

-

When he wakes again, he’s not so cold.

He is wrapped in furs in his childhood bedroom, smelling of smoke and salt. His body aches, but by now, pain is a fact of existence. He only wonders why, if this is death, it hurts at all. Theon thinks he’s earned a respite by now, if nothing else.

That same red flash catches his eye. He looks to his right.

Sansa’s hair is spread across the furs, her head nestled next to his side, one hand slipped into his. She wears no glove. He can feel the veins on the back of her hand against his fingertips, so fragile and so not. Her eyes are closed, but her brow is furrowed. He knows, then, that this _must_ be where he goes after, and he must have done something right to end up here.

“She’s been here the whole time.”

Theon startles, realizing dully that in doing so, he’s pulled something in his left side. His other arm is wrapped in a sling. He looks up.

Bran is sitting in the corner, watching them both in that empty way he does. “I must say, Theon, I didn’t see that coming.”

Theon wets his lips, tries to speak, but his voice is scratchy from disuse.

“She’s been keeping vigil,” Bran says softly. “Four nights. She wouldn’t leave this room.”

His gaze drifts back to Sansa. Theon can feel her breath now, warm on his side, small, rhythmic gasps.

“How?”

“Arya. But you bought her the time she needed.”

 _And she’d brought him the resilience he needed, once again_.

“Wake her,” says Bran. “I’m sure you have plenty of things to discuss. Thank you, Theon.”

He waits until someone comes for Bran and wheels him away, and then he turns to her once more. She hasn’t moved. Theon is loathe to disturb the peace she’s snatched from the chaos.

Her hand is so warm in his. He craves the warmth, wants to draw it into himself, melt the last icy recesses there.

Sansa twitches, and Theon draws a harsh breath, realizing he’d clutched her hand too tight. He lets go, but her fingers close around his and her eyes open.

“Theon,” she says, her voice the sound of spring, of promises kept and of a soft place to land. “You came back.”

Sansa blinks up at him, doe-eyed, as if she’s in as much disbelief that Theon is here as he is of her. She folds his right hand between both of hers, presses a kiss to the inside of his wrist.

“I tried for you.”

**Author's Note:**

> shat this out instead of doing schoolwork bc i just want him to be happy :'(  
> title from this cheesy ass quote i love that probs came from tumblr: "I think we deserve a soft epilogue, my love. We are good people and we've suffered enough.”


End file.
